Category Archives: SEO Copywriting

Most companies looking to get more business on the internet know they need high-quality, regularly published content. And when it comes to creating a content strategy, writing various types of content, tracking the results and adjusting the plan, a professional content team usually gets the best results.

Despite this fact, though, many marketers end up finding themselves responsible for creating blog posts, email copy, social media posts, product descriptions and much more - regardless of whether or not they're strong writers. Marketers looking to improve their writing and create more effective content should keep these tips in mind:

A common misconception about content marketing is that it's only valuable for large brands. Small-to-medium sized businesses (SMBs) may not feel they have the resources, budget or time to use content creation as a strategy that boosts web traffic, builds an audience and ultimately increases sales.

However, the number one most important rule for ensuring content marketing ROI is to provide value. Neither large companies nor SMBs have to spend exorbitant amounts of money or time to create extremely valuable content that gets results. In fact, one of the best resources for content ROI is your own employees.

Content is more likely to accomplish its goals when it's in the right format. Would the content attract more attention and generate more leads as a blog post, ebook, social post, video, infographic, quiz or survey? If it's going to be a blog, should it be a quick read or an in-depth report? Would it work best as a numbered list or a how-to guide?

One format that's often overlooked, however, is "question and answer." The Q&A format is often reserved solely for FAQ pages, but with the rise of two important SEO trends - Google's featured snippets and voice search - Q&A content could be an incredibly effective part of a business's content strategy.

In December of 2013, the Federal Trade Commission began investigating what was then a burgeoning content marketing strategy - native advertising. The investigation sought to answer many questions, but perhaps most pressingly, the FTC wanted to know if typical readers truly understand when they're being presented with paid content, what "paid content" means, and the ethics of essentially disguising promotional content as editorial.

Over two years later - now that native advertising is incredibly popular - the FTC has finally released guidelines for publishers, and they could end up changing how many advertisers approach this strategy.

Looking at the top search trends of the year helps internet marketers, content creators, SEO professionals and webmasters understand how people use the internet. While these lists are typically dominated by celebrities, news events and sports moments, they nevertheless provide valuable insight and perspective for anyone hoping to attract more traffic to their site.

And while the importance of search engines may be diminishing slightly when compared to other methods of content delivery such as social media, these lists could help content creators find audiences in unexpected places (like Yahoo, for instance).